Draw me a Picture
by a tattered rose
Summary: Goren and Eames. Every relationship changes. Sometimes for the good, sometimes for the bad, sometimes all you can do is remember.
1. Snap, Crackle, Pop

Disclaimer:  Most of what I own is within 10 feet of me.  I am in Boston.  CI is not.  Therefore, it is a tautological conclusion that I do not own anything associated with Law and Order: Criminal Intent.

  
Author's Note:  So sick I didn't go to school today (and that's sick) I, in my sleepless haze, poked around in the Criminal Intent section at Fanfiction.net, and was pleasantly surprised.  Dazed and confused, I was motivated to write my own fic, to say thank you to all out there who make my day better.

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She had always assumed it would be a case that would finally crack him.

A pile of dead bodies, as vulnerable after death as they had been in it, and no one in jail paying for the loss.  A question mark hanging over a file which hours of labor had failed to grant illumination.  A perp a little bit too slimy, too deranged, a killer with a mental flow Bobby could understand too deeply.  It would all go as it had gone before, except he would slip, and this time he would not be able to catch himself, she would not be able to bring him back with a word and a touch, and whether that was the last act or he had many left to go, that would be that for Bobby Goren, detective –and partner- extraordinaire.

It was one of those expectations that are latent, hidden so deeply within the process of living one unremarkable day after another that she wouldn't even have been indignant at the suggestion; only surprised.  The day to day is run by routine, and over the years it had almost become routine for Bobby to occasionally come close to the edge, but never to fall.

At last, it wasn't a case that did it.  Granted, the stack of unsolved and failed prosecutions they had garnered over the years collected like the season's first snow on his shoulders, peered out at her from exhausted eyes while his voice told her that he was fine, sleep being all that was necessary until he was good as new.  Made it that much more difficult for him to shake himself free and continue on.

Eames often thought of what a new Bobby would have been like, fresh from the box and plastic, free of the cares and worries that hadn't even waited until he was an adult to seek him out.  

She knew she had been expecting him to eventually fail in his struggle with sanity because when he did, it wasn't the what, but the why that surprised her the most.

Sometimes, when it was late at night, and her mind was so fatigued that she forgave it any indiscretion, she tried to picture a new Bobby meeting a new Alex, ties to the real world not broken, but never formed.  Thought about what they might say when there were no words and no history, only the two of them, sharing the wonder of being alive in a promising new world.

In waking hours, they were who they had always been.  Two four dimensional creatures, side by side with the rest of the police force for a small distance at least.  Closer, yes, paths intertwined, perhaps, but no more than a small knot after miles of independent histories.

Conceited, to think of herself as the knot that he couldn't quickly untangle and be done with.  To be the one –yes, she could allow that there were others- that came at the wrong time, when he was strong enough to try but too weak to succeed.

As his partner, it was more than her job, it was her duty to help him pick himself up.  As his friend, whenever she saw him hurt, all she wanted was to fix him.

And now it was her fault that he was broken.

So many years, and she thought she knew it all.  She committed the cardinal sin of detective work and assumed that similar situations would produce a similar result.  It was happily oblivious under this false estimation that she took his silence to be his usual silence, and overlooked the way his hands wouldn't stop playing with each other.

She did know he would be upset.  They had finally caught a man whose mentally ill wife was unable to protect her young son, much less do anything for the drifters he would drag home and slowly burn, limb by limb, until they died.

Alex did not know what Bobby's childhood had been like.  She did know that he would see a part of his self in that boy.  Did know that she needed to take him home, needed to let him be quite, and needed to listen not to what he would say, but to what his eyes told her when she would ask if he wanted her to stay with him.

She knew these things because this is what had happened before.  Years of knowing him had reduced her to a stock of responses, when she no longer studied him to try and locate what had struck him and how and why. 

As the police had taken away the mother, gently but taking no risks as they removed her to the hospital she had been in need of for so long, Alex had seen the pale thin hand reach out.  Had seen the panicked eyes searching for her little boy, and seen the boy react, running to his mother and grabbing her hand, pressing it to his tearstained face even as the officers around him wondered if perhaps he was in danger.  Had seen the police finally relent, and allow the boy to accompany his mother until child protective services would intervene.  Had seen the back doors close and the ambulance drive off, leaving a crime scene and those who would be working it.

Had noticed Bobby as he witnessed the same scene.  But had not thought of what he would see.

She pulled into the lot behind his building, still thinking she had all the answers.  

"Bobby?"  A gentle voice in his ear, an equally gentle hand on his arm were apologetic reminders of the real world.

"Yeah?  Oh, thanks."  His aimless glance was orienting, and he opened the door as if to get out.  Instead, he fell back, the car rocking from his weight landing back on the passenger seat.  His hands rose to cover his face, and with elbows in he was as curled up as over 200 pounds of muscle can curl.

It would only be a minute before he collected himself.  Out of habit Eames would be there for him.  She opened her own door and crossed around the front, kneeling quietly before him until his hands came down.

"Do you want me to stay?"  The familiar question.  Once innocent, now she hoped he would say no.

"Alex-"  He was tall.  So much taller than her when he was standing.  And they were very close now.  And she wasn't looking at him, wasn't paying enough attention to see that when he reached for her, he wasn't seeing Alex, the woman he maybe might be something in the realm of in love with, but Alex, the friend he needed comfort from, right then.

No, she had thought it was all about her, making it all about her when it should have been about him.

"-Bobby- no.  I- we can't."  She had stepped back from his embrace, holding up a hand between them as if to ward him off.  It was then she saw her mistake.  

"What?  I don't know..."  He stepped away as well, responding to her rejection even as he didn't understand why.  He hit the side of her car, bringing a hand to his temple as if that would help him understand what was going on.

Then she saw that he was not thinking of their 'almost' kiss, but of his constantly buried need for the safety a family can provide.  That he was not even thinking of her, but has become lost, for a moment, in the pain of the past, and the desire that his mother would extend her hand to him, from the depths of her own personal hell.

As soon as she saw this she tried to go to him, but already he had moved past it, pushing it back into wherever he stored hurtful thoughts and memories.

It was a familiar transition, from his private world to the world she inhabited with him.  But when she had pushed him away he slipped, and it was with an unfamiliar expression in his eye that he turned again to face her.

"You 'can't' huh?  Who'd it make jealous?"  This was him drunk.  This was him more than drunk, worse, but he hadn't had a drop.

"Bobby-"  They were both overtired.  She tried to take his arm, even to put her hand on his cheek.  A plea to ignore everything she had said, if only he would calm down, let her take him home.

"No!"  He was shaking.  He used one hand against the car to steady himself, to push off enough to remain standing.  "Or is it just me?  Huh?  It's just me, isn't it, that you 'can't'?"

Unsteady as he was, he hung over her.  There were times Alex had been afraid for Bobby; times she'd been afraid with him, or in spite of him.  This was the first time she had been afraid of him.  

"What?   C-c-c-cat got your tongue?"  He used the ridiculous mocking stutter that should only have been directed at criminals, never his partner.  

He was treating her like scum, and he was laughing, and this wasn't the Bobby she knew so she didn't know what he was capable of.  She stopped herself from shrinking away from him, hoping that he could hear her.

"Bobby, I want to help you."  She focused on his eyes, wanting to understand.  Against better judgment, her hand crept out to take his, hating the tremors that hit him because she knew how it would upset him to show this sign of weakness, even to her.

He used none of the power he was capable of when he knocked her hands away.  Still, she pulled her hand back and shrunk away like he had slapped her.  He watched all of this and she knew he understood, but instead of apologizing he was laughing, and his laugh did nothing to reassure her.  "Want to help me?  With what?  With this?"  He was getting in her face, trying to disconcert her, and even though she had committed no crime against the law, she was frightened.  It was with new panic that she watched his arm move as if to grab his crotch suggestively.  It was then with relief and new concern that she followed his hand up until it gesturing to the air around them.

"Now you're saying,"  He pushed her away by dropping back in the fashion the old Bobby would, making the show without hurting her.  "that you want to help me, with what?  With all this?  With this?"  His hand touched his chest, right over his heart, and he was pleading with her for one moment until he was angry again.  "What?"

"-Bobby?"  One of her classes had been on how to talk to the mentally ill.  But this was her partner.

"So you want to help me, but, oh, what's that?  You just said you _can't.  Why __can't you?"  He was pacing and shouting and she was crying not because her Bobby was gone, but because this __was her Bobby, mutated and degraded and faded, yet the same man._

"Why can't you?  Because, of, of who it might jealous?  Or maybe because we're partners.  Right?  Is that it?  I'll bet it is because that's a pretty good reason.  Leaves things open to interpretation, calling on a form of honor, not offensive to me… Or maybe you value our friendship too much to jeopardize it, right?"  In the interrogation room, she watched him pull these tricks on numbers of suspects.  Knowing what was coming didn't help lessen the shock as his voice played down into a calm agreeable tone, before flying off again into a shout.  "NO.  You can't why?  You can't, with me.  That's right, isn't it?  You _can't_ because it's _me_."  

Just as quickly, he was near tears and she didn't know what to say.

"Why not me?  Huh, why not-?" The sound of his name broke through the anger of his latest tirade.  "Why?  Seriously, Alex.  Because we're partners?"  He was nodding so complacently that she was nodding along before he shouted again.  "No!  If we weren't partners, you still wouldn't.   It's because of, of me, of who I am…  Because of what's here, right, what's going to happen?"

He was pointing to his head and they were both crying.  Both knew he was nearing the end of his strength.

"Bobby!-"  She was reaching out to him again but this time he shrank from her touch.  

"No!"  Still moving away, but his joints were too weak, he couldn't help it, and the next minute he was unconscious.

Alex rushed to him, cradled his head and wondered what to do.  For the longest time she sat there, holding him, unable to call the police.


	2. And as we Breath in Tandem

Disclaimer:  In my last disclaimer, the first premise was false, and the conclusion was not a logical consequence.  It was, however a correct conclusion, and it stands.

Author's Notes: Eh, what do I need to say here?  Firstly, many thanks to everyone who reviewed the first bit.  The amount of support was really unexpected and much nicer than I deserve ;  BTW, it's also nice to hear that they were decently in character – thank yourselves and the other writers out there!  I haven't watched the show in a long while, anything I do know basically comes from others' portrayals.

Secondly – I do have doubts about this chapter.  I think it needs serious rewriting, but I don't currently know how to fix it so…  Well, up it goes, with my hopes that it's at least readable.

Happy turkey day ~*+!

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A month earlier.

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And like is almost always the case, it was a perfectly ordinary day which was to end in interpersonal disaster.  In a similar fashion, each child is born equal, unknowing of what future pain fate may have in store for him.

As reliable as the sun the new assignments were doled out.  This file saw them clear out of town, to a suburban ranch which was showing all of New York that Gary Springfield was a real solid down to earth guy who would do a pluck up job for the people as Senate Representative.  

From early polls the ten million dollar property was pulling its weight, even in a time of agricultural subsidies.  Only two things could mess this up for him: American Mad Cow Disease, or a scandal.  As of sunrise that morning, he had caught a case of the latter.  Symptoms?  Much misdirected and misguided shouting at every official or officer a mayor has the clout shout at.

Deakins was out there now, sneezing and getting the wrong end of the deal from nature and politics.  Being a detective, then, had fringe benefits, and Eames and Goren were free to run the crime scene, and ignore the disturbance outside.

"Do you see this?"  Goren pointed up with his pen, apparently indicating some point on the body of the 15 year old Caucasian male whose bare feet were still swinging slightly some ten feet above their heads.

"What?"  Eames crossed next to him, in order to see where he was pointing.  She had been at the other side of the barn, ostensibly searching the packed earth for footprints, but his call did not catch her unawares.  Her own survey of the scene had been concluded several minutes before; the time since having been filled in watching _Goren_._  By carefully watching him, one could read what he was seeing._

A minute before, he had been looking upwards, slowly rotating.  He would periodically stop, then start but this time as he looked his head suddenly jerked around, a small, habitual rotation that meant a clue.  Many would have hailed the discovery then.  Not Goren.  Instead he spent a full minute re-covering the interior of the barn with his gaze, reordering his thoughts to include the new data and checking for consistency and plausibility before he would subject his theory to her ears.

"His hands."  His voice was too high, too soft for a man his size.  Maybe it was this initial shock that started to lull suspects under his spell, to charm everyone else as soon as he put some thought to the matter.

Eames looked up, and the first thing she noticed was how small the boy's hands were, how vulnerable the slight curve of the fingers around empty air, and the cuts on his wrists, caused by the handcuffs that prevented him from trying to save himself as he fell downward, the slack in the rope running out.

"Are those scratches?"  What she had first seen as shadows in his palm had changed shape and character as she squinted.

"Cut him down!"  The officers in the loft above moved into action with relief.  They didn't have to watch the body from their position, but seeing the slight sway of a rope, and knowing what is on the other end, somewhere below your feet, brings the shadow of nightmare into the daylight hours.

"You think rope burn?"  As they cleared the area for the body's descent, Eames put some conclusions together, twisting to gauge her partner's reaction to her hinted suggestion.

"It might be.  Wait until we can check him up close to be sure."  But he was pleased that she had seen what he had seen, and that her mind was exploring down the same path as his.

Before the body was resting on the ground Goren was beside it, running a gloved finger carefully over the welts on the boy's arms.  He looked up and there was pain in his eyes, the same pain, the old pain that was reborn like a phoenix from the ash of each dead, flying straight into the detective's heart until he solved the mystery and gave the soul some peace.

"It wasn't suicide."

Long ago they had each convinced themselves that this pain Bobby expressed was empathy, that it honed his abilities and drove his success.  Sometimes, Alex thought that she was the only of them who would admit that perhaps it was hurting him more than he showed.

 It wasn't suicide, and while tragic, it was also straightforward.  Politics kept them at the scene, but by nightfall there was nothing left to do, no one else left to even pretend to be doing it.

She had stayed, that last hour, because he stayed.  In a bout of good humor she considered quipping that she had stayed only because he was sitting on the front of her car, and so long as he weighted it down, she could not move.  But it was too dark, too quiet, and he blended too well into the somber picture for her jokes.

"Ready to head back there partner?"  She settled for gentle levity, settling next to him against her hood.  

"It's really a beautiful night.  We're not even that far from the city lights but look-"  He was looking upwards, and at his nod she did likewise.

"It's gorgeous."  And it really was.  Stars were still but a sprinkle across the sky, but the added twinkle of even the extra few dozen felt like a gift from nature.

She leaned back farther, until her head rested against the cool metal.  In high school, she would often drive out with friends, and they would sit on the hoods like this and talk for hours.  Of school, life, their dreams…

Her legs weren't long enough to touch the ground, toes barely in contact with damp grass all that prevented her from slipping.  It was in pulling her feet up to rest on her bumper instead that she did slip, sliding a few inches before she could stop herself.  Stopped, in fact, as her thigh hit his.

"Sorry."  Was her automatic response, but she quelled the urge to pull away.  He was big, and he was warm, and she hadn't realized how cool and empty the air around her was.  Which was her excuse for not moving, rather enjoying the sensation and awaiting his response.

One didn't come and she wondered if he even knew she was beside him.  Touching him.  And while he wasn't phobic about contact, he was reserved, and should have scooted over, giving them both a thin layer of personal space.  But he wasn't moving and though Eames now couldn't move without attracting suspicion, she was starting to become uncomfortable.  He was warm and he was real and while she knew that he didn't want her and she didn't want him and there was no way in hell they would, could, or should become more to each other than partners and friends, she also knew that friends could share a moment together, watching the stars, and it had been too long since she'd shared something like this.

"Lean back."  Turning on her side she used her free hand to tug at Bobby's sleeve.  Despite the breeze he had taken off his jacket long before, and through the thinner material of his dress shirt she could feel the hairs standing up on his arm.  And like those nights back in high school she let the hormones move before her brain and during the infinite pause before he turned his head she ran her fingers up his sleeve, a light touch that would tickle his arm as the weave tickled her fingertips.

It was in his eyes.  'Don't'.  A plea, but it was quiet and she felt alive and daring and wanted to know his secrets.

"You're going to get a crick in your neck sitting like that."  Again, gentle pressure, forget there was any other kind of touch.

Obediently, he lay back, arms crossed over a ribcage nearly as high as she was wide.  Now that he could see the stars in front of him his eyes were closed.  For the span of five breaths she watched him, before lying back down herself.  They were no longer touching, and for several minutes they remained like that, each alone on the hood of a car, within a wash of darkness and crickets.

The crickets were loud in her ear when he spoke: his voice, even as whisper, drowning out even those millions tiny violinists.  "Yeah, it is."  They were looking at each other now, his voice having naturally drawn their attentions away from inner reflection. 

"What?"  Knowing what he meant, but challenging him to mean more, to get the hell up, to start talking on like usual and forestall the moment they might have coming.

"Beautiful."  A voice so near a sigh that her stomach fainted, before coming to and clenching around the sudden hard panic that she may have incited something she didn't want and shouldn't have gotten.  This desire to stop it, to get up and break the mood that they could be settling into, would have won but that his eyes had met hers and her body had stopped obeying merely the mentally shouted bid of her conscious brain.

"Really?"  If she had to lie there, was that really the best she could come up with?

"Yea."

"Articulate tonight, aren't we?"  And experience knocks one out of the field.

"I thought you wanted to-"  Words cut off as she stopped his gesturing by taking his hand, taking them down between their bodies until their knuckles brushed each other's thighs.

His breath had become a bit uneven and she thought 'who did he hug?'  And then deliberately tortured him by running her thumb over his fingers.  Who did he hug?  She hugged her extensive family, the friends she didn't see often enough but were always leaving messages on her machine letting her know how loved she was.

"Who do you hug?"  Out loud.  Spur of the moment, she wanted to know if her guess was right, wanted to see how he would answer, wanted to goad him into pushing her away for something so trivial so she could follow him.  

"What?"  He was listening to her, and though his eyes were now open, she knew all his attention was on her.

"Who do you hug?"  She wondered if he hugged his mom.  Then she wondered if his mom hugged him back.  

She turned into his silence and it hit her.  Familiar people and things make their own representation in the mind.  Watching him next to her this was stripped and she wasn't looking at Goren, her partner, or Bobby, her friend, but a man she really knew almost nothing about, aside from his talent, his gentleness…

His personal neatness, and how solid he always felt.  Close as he was his aftershave, cologne?- was closer, describing to her nose the outline of his body, the clean lines of muscle and bone, nourished and connected by circulating blood that would return to a living heart, pulsing next through the soft part of his neck where the added heat would send more scent her way before feeding his brain- the one organ she couldn't understand, even with all her training and experience.

He had emotions, and this frightened her.  Emotions deeper and more real than any he would show in the interrogation room, more permanent than the smile he would give her when they were both in good moods.  He was human, so they would be there, but these probable emotions frightened her as the monster under the bed frightens a child.  When it's dark and you can't see, anything could be there.

Large and powerful, and he was stretched out, vulnerable to her.  She sat up, the better to observe him, but the motion gave him excuse to leave, gently extricating his hand from hers before getting to his feet.  

"It's getting late – we should head back.  Do you want me to drive?"  Ever the gentleman, but he wouldn't look at her.

"No, I'm fine."  They were in the car, not talking, not moving.  The radio might have broken the uncomfortable silence but the motion to switch it on would have forced them to acknowledge what for now could be ignored.

She pulled up next to his car and they would have to say goodbye.

"Bobby?"  She thought again, who does he hug?

"Yea?"  She could see that he wanted to get out, but wouldn't move until she was done.

"We're friends, you know.  You can talk to me."  Again she took his hand, a substitute for a hug.

An incline of the head, to indicate he had heard.  "Thanks" because he couldn't leave without saying something, and she would have let it go at that except that he gave her hand a squeeze before pulling away.

"Bobby."

He turned, a question in his eyes while he waited for her to walk around the car.

"Give me a hug."  How can a gentleman refuse?  As soon as she had him she hung on, cheek in his shoulder, and after a minute he relaxed.  Their bodies tilted as he leaned back against the car door, and she smiled when she felt his chin come down to lightly rest on top of her head.

The hug had become an embrace, and she twisted herself until her hip rested against his thigh, and the lengths of their bodies were touching.  Then she looked up and the night was ruined because she was foolish and her eyes were talking poetry.  His responded in kind and this was the worst because while she could allow herself a moment of weakness, the last thing Bobby ever wanted to do was to lose control.

Two trajectories were going to collide, unless one stopped.  It wouldn't be her.  

His forehead dropped down, resting on hers in an apology rather than rejection.  His chest rose with one ragged breath and her body responded with a pull of arousal.  

She expected him to leave her then.  To her surprise he gave her another hug, with shaky arms and a whispered "thank you" with ambiguous meaning but transparent emotion.

Her eyes sought him once before she pulled out but he wasn't looking at her so she let it go, already upset with herself for letting her take a spur of the moment desire so far with someone she had to work with each day.

Mad that she had apparently let her recent lack of a personal life had led her to tease her poor partner, who was never anything but sweet to her and a good friend.  Angry that she may have ruined their friendship, but smiling too, because he had held her like a lifeline, and had kissed her with her eyes before stopping himself.

Goren pulled out of the parking lot ten minutes later, upset with himself for many of the same reasons, but still feeling her pressed close.


	3. Call my Bluff

Disclaimer:  Whatever I said last time.

Author's Note:  Tricky chapter to write.  I think it's the right one.

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It was three-eighths of a mile hike from the beat up shoulder of a little used country road.

She hiked it without resting: she never would give up.  Once there, however, she settled down on a neighboring tombstone.  Ol' Bernard Frasier, Loving Father and Husband.  Alex always said that the two of them, Ol' Bernie and she, they'd better be real good friends in the hereafter - what with the intimate knowledge he was gaining of her in the herein.  

The joke was old, but it had never been about the humor.

She knew Bernie wouldn't take offense.  He hadn't been anywhere near spring when he kicked off so he knew how it felt.  Anyway, she and death ought to start getting to be on good terms, if they weren't already squared away.

It was Bernie she sat on, but it was Goren she'd come to see.  Many times had she thought whether it would be better or worse if she were to sit on her old partner during their visits.  His small plaque, a footnote to the grass, had nothing to offer in the lumbar region, so the question had been merely academic for some time.

These trips had occurred less and less often over time.  Little things were always coming up: an appointment with the hair-dressers, one of the kids was sick, she wasn't comfortable driving until Randy put the snow tires on.  Small excuses, and she had grabbed at each.

As the number of occasions diminished, the amount of ritual increased.  She had let the engine idle for a full minute before shutting it off.  She had never broken stride during the hike partway up the small hill.  She sat herself on the memorial to a deceased man she'd never met, and gave a few moments to their odd relationship.  And now she would conjure up the dead.

Freeze frames and short clips were jumbled and likely represented one solitary iota of actual history.  But that didn't matter because she was searching for his smile, for the wrinkles around his eyes, for the set of his head when he was in contemplation.  He looked up at her across their desks: such a mundane even, onset.  Their eyes caught, he gave her a grin, and she was laughing with him.

More complete memories.  The first time they met.  The first time she realized how far he would go.  The day she had returned from her first maternity leave.  

The way he had looked at her after they caught the Lepner murderer.  That night at a politician's farm, sitting on the hood of her car.  The letters he'd left her- every time she touched one she could feel him writing it.

The first time he was shot in front of her.  His first break down.  The way, when he fell for the last time, he looked at her and he _knew_…

She had thought she was mature when she transferred to the Major Case Squad.   She'd done well in school and at the academy, her time on the beat and in vice had gained her more friends than foes.  After putting in a decent number of years, she was reaching her professional goals, she was enjoying it, and she was enjoying it without any part of her anatomy sagging.

She was always an 'old soul', which gave her more leverage in the maturity game.  She had buried a husband.  There was no more room to grow up.

Then she met Bobby Goren.

In all the years they would be friends, she would never figure out whether he was one of the world's oldest souls, or one of it's youngest.

Since retirement had emptied her days, Alex had turned slowly back to the church.  Once again she spent hours in the pews or on her knees, guiltily not thinking about god.  Now she received less reassurance, her imagination leapt to the grim rather than the fairies.  However many times she tried, beginning with the most beautiful ancient infant, back came the sad and the horrible: the soul dying in birth, or new fruit choked of it's sweetness by the old dried shell…

He wouldn't be pinned down.  A Goren thought flitted through her mind, casting shadows and suggestion.  All that was definite was his bulk, large and warm and protective.  

Their relationship had spanned so many years.  So many emotions, so many landmark events.  

When you spend many of your waking hours, including many you'd normally be asleep, with another person, when many of your adult memories include, in some way, the other person, and when this is you for the better part of twenty years, how can you classify him?  What role did he play in her life?  How could she be who she is without him?

He was just 57 when he died.  They hadn't managed to push him out of the force.  He had never been retired.

Which was only relevant because for years she had promised herself that when they were both out of the force, no longer 'partners', then they might start a new kind of relationship.  She didn't expect miracles.  But if she could live out her life in his arms, that wasn't a bad way to go.

She was a few hours from 75.  She had retired soon after Bobby's death, and had spent most of the intervening years with the family's eldest and youngest.

This had left her emotionally fulfilled but expectant.  

It would be a cosmic joke, albeit a small one, if their ages at death were palindromically linked.  Without having any specific knowledge or plans, she had never thought to see 76.

In front of her Bobby rose.  He would always come when she called to him.  She was starting to cry and he was trying to show her memories of the good times.  Her mind wrenched away.  She didn't want to forget the bad times.  They all together, good and bad, left her with a life that she could only describe as 'emotionally fulfilled'… but expectant.  

'Emotionally fulfilled' garnered either knowing glance or look askance.  At a certain point, their colleagues had decided that either the two were fooling around after hours, or she was doing some serious quiet pining which he either didn't, or wouldn't, notice.  They were only given those options.  And this was frustration because she could yell "we're just partners" and mean it without reserve.  They were what they seemed to be, without the dime-store elaboration.

Which was almost hypocritical of her, since she had always believed he'd proposed to her, in his way, not long before the coronary took him out.

She was off babysitting duties for the New Year's and she and Bobby had gone to dinner.  They were perfecting the after-dinner stroll when he pulled the ring box out of his pocket.  This wasn't an event- he liked giving her small presents he had 'found' on his travels.

And they looked like he had picked them up somewhere.  This looked more like…

"It's beautiful."

Yellow and white gold intertwined in a fashion that was either incredibly old, viz. Goren, or incredibly strangely wonderful, also viz. Goren.  She let him put it on her right ring finger, and they were looking at each other… …expectantly.  He had dared to brush his lips past hers, she had dared more.

The next day they were swept up in a new case, and days quickly became weeks.  Weeks became months then he was gone.  And always on her right hand she had worn his ring.  Life often tempted her to switch the ring over, minor revisionist history for comfort's sake.  Every time she held back, clinging to a belief she barely dared say to herself: that if she went to the grave with his ring, _he_ might move it to her left hand.

She had always believed you see loved ones after you die.  Why couldn't you do more than say "hi, how are you?"  

They were unfinished business.  She missed him.  No one could tell her what was missing in her life.  

It wasn't simply love.  It sounded silly to say she was in need.  It sounded even worse to try and explain it as the feeling you get when you read a novel like WutheringHeights.  Like you have finally found perfection in suffering, and can now practice using your whole heart.

Not an emotion she could describe.  But it felt good and she was old and so she kept it.  

He was somewhere before her, listening.  And she realized how much she had been talking.  How much she had had to say.  She felt freer, lighter.  She felt pleasantly empty.

This what she had come to say, to them both.  And she hoped one of them understood, because that would be her last trip to the cemetery until she was carried in.

She got to her feet, smiling at the lush grass over Bobby's grave, patting Bernie's tombstone one last time and with real affection.  Going down the hill she paused many times during the three-eighths of a mile hike.  

There was a sharp drop off down to her car and she caught herself against the door, badly-treaded shoes slipping on the ice.  She unlocked the door and the car was given ample time to warm itself.  Her nerves were shaken, her emotions frayed, and her knee hurt where she had banged it.  She sat until the heat was comforting and right before she was ready to pull out her muscles spasmed, and she knew Goren was sitting next to her in the car.  

As she pulled out slowly, because of the ice, into the dark twists of the roadway, she didn't look to her right, for fear he would fade away.  And when she turned to her left she caught a glimpse of reflected headlights and she was… expectant.


End file.
